Helen Mirren Shows a Real Woman’s Body

Speaking of real women’s bodies — you gotta love Helen Mirren who at almost 65 is not afraid to show us a real woman’s body.

Photo by Juergen Teller

She’s got a new flick – Love Ranch – directed by hubby Taylor Hackford opening next week where she plays the owner of a legal brothel in Reno in the 70s. And she gets to have a hot affair with a young Argentinian boxer.

She talked to NY Magazine about Love Ranch and embracing her sexuality throughout her career:

The Playboy Mansion, coke, and the rise of all that—Guccione and Hefner always pushed it as liberation, but it didn’t seem like that to me,” she says. “That was women obeying the sexualized form created by men—though maybe we always do that, because we want to be attractive. But I was kind of a trailblazer because I demanded to do it my own way. I’d say, ‘I’m not having it put on me by someone else.’ I didn’t want to be the sort of puritanical good girl with a little white collar who says, ‘Don’t shag until you get married.’

her sexual confidence is seriously amazing, it’s such a turn-on. I agree with her about Playboy. from what I’ve seen in old issues (and still to this day) of Playboy, they want the Bunnies to be nice, sweet, polite and obedient. fuckkkkk that.

I think Helen Mirren is a great actress and I love that she is still working in an industry that seems to think women are worthless after they hit forty. However, I am also sick of actresses stripping naked to get attention for themselves and the movies they are promoting. This really isn’t any different than Jennifer Lawrence posing in skimp bathing suits for Esquire. I think when actresses strip for magazines, they are trying to broaden their appeal by making themselves sexually attractive to the male audience. Their bodies and sexuality are put first and their talents and abilities second.

Or how often do you see them draped on women who are fully dressed ….I’m looking at you Vanity Fair.

Women are supposed to be compliant and pleasing to the male gaze.

And then there’s the creeping nasty censorship of women showing disapproval or anger. I mean, men in movies and tv can show the full range of emotions, while women are expected to have froze face.

Ironically, there’s a story on nbc about how Botox not only makes you look like you have a flat line on your emotions…it actually slowly MAKES you have less emotion. You know, those nasty kinds of emotion like anger or displeasure or sadness. Womens don’t need those anyway because those nasty emotions lead to womens asking for things or change.

I remember that recent photo shoot (not sure if it was Vanity Fair, which is obsessed with naked actresses) with Robert Pattison (the guy from Twilight) hanging out with all these naked women. He wasn’t naked, god forbid.

I love this picture and don’t think it’s for a male gaze at all. There is something very knowing about it. She is looking at us in a slightly defiant way as if she’s saying “yes I’m naked, what of it?” Deaf Indian Muslim Anarchist is right about Mirren’s sexual confidence. This picture shows that really well but it is about the sexiness she has on her own terms; it doesn’t depend upon the viewer’s approval.

Another thing that I adore about the photograph is the humanity. It really shows Mirren as a person first before celebrity or woman even. That probably doesn’t make sense.

Soirore , it makes perfect sense and shows you’re the only one posting that “gets it”. The conversation about women being photographed naked is a separate topic to this photo. First, no magazine photographs an older woman like this because the older members of our society are constantly desexualized and treated like children. Mirren is taking that concept and turning it upside down. She’s doing a naked shot, as well, because it ties into her latest project. It’s not just an act of personal defiance, it’s an act of professional defiance.